Offa's Dyke - 2025: Day 8 - Knighton to to Disgwylfa Hill

I awoke wondering at the chaos in my large room and how being in the confines of a small tent seems to lend itself to tidiness and organisation. But my kit, spread around room and radiators, was now dry and the forecast was for good weather.

There was no food in the hotel and the cafe across the road was shut so I set off at 7.30am without breakfast and headed up the hill behind Knighton. It was a bit of an effort, especially after yesterday where, despite the weather and those warnings about it being the 'hardest' day, I generally felt well motivated and in a positive frame of mind throughout. In retrospect I certainly didn’t find it as hard as the first couple of days in the Clwydian hills, although after seven days of walking my body is no doubt better 'broken in' and was therefore more able to respond to yesterday’s challenges.

Once on the long and undulating flat above Knighton it was a wonderful walk, the best part of the day. The air was fresh but not cold and I was blessed with blue sky and a warming sun as I walked the gently rolling, grassy tops in a cooling breeze. It seemed I was surrounded by beauty, every view a photograph. To my left were the high points of the slopes of these Shropshire Hills, to my right a more rugged scene as the ground dropped gently away to a deep valley, the far side in the middle distance a patchwork of greens and browns on rugged and hilly terrain: the Radnor Forest area and the beginnings of the bigger hills of the Black Mountains and Brecon Beacons. Far below I could see a small village and the thin black line of a road that weaved its way along the valley floor. Occasional Sunday traffic drifted along it but here up on the tops and looking down, at that moment I felt an intense sense of detachment from the world below and an affinity to the beauty of the nature around me.

I had three climbs of note that morning - although plenty of smaller ones in between - but none seemed to compare to previous days. The last was a steep, curving climb onto a fern covered hilltop before Kington. It was then a couple of miles of field and hedge and dyke as I slowly descended towards the town. Just before Kington the route crosses the local golf course and on chatting to a passing local I learned the clubhouse did a good Sunday lunch. I had planned to stop in Kington itself before continuing my walk but I was unsure which places might serve food and what might be open on a Sunday. Taking the view 'better the devil you know' I made the short detour around one of the fairways to the clubhouse and enjoyed a beer and substantial carvery.

It was a short walk into Kington after lunch, a nice, tiny market town full of age and character, but it seemed liked an endless climb out, up the long slopes of the Herget Ridge that lay behind. It was undoubtedly beautiful walking: wide green tracks through bracken and gorse and not so steep that I had cause to break my pace except when I stopped to talk to other walkers or to enjoy the sweeping views. But it was also nearly four miles walking to cross that hill and at times I began to wonder when it would end and whether the destination I had in mind for the night may be a little too far. My concerns proved unfounded though and I am now camped among fern and bracken on Disgwylfa Hill about six miles north of Hay on Wye after two more miles of tracks and fields, and forests and dyke. And a few more hills than I would have liked after so many miles and so late in the day.